Shepherd of the Cross Lutheran ChurchLuke 21: 5-19 | Looking around the world, it might seem as though the end of the world is near. But Jesus focuses our attention away from uncertainty to the stability of his promises. In Christ, we do not need to be afraid. Instead, we are invited to hang onto God’s promises and keep the faith as we live in the meantime, awaiting Christ’s return.
Earlier this spring, area congregations were challenged to meet a diaper need in our community. Thanks to your help, we were able to support two day care centers. But, the need did not simply disappear. For that reason, several local non-profits and congregations have banded together to create the Community Diaper Bank (CDB). The CDB will be open to partner agencies and diapers will be distributed through area agencies to individuals and families. Emergency diapers will be available at places like MCSA and Salvation Army.
Our goal is quite lofty: to fill a 53-foot semi-trailer with diapers and be prepared to distribute diapers as of January 1, 2020.
But to do that, we need your help in two ways:
Purchase Diapers
Help With Start-Up Costs
We have a few outstanding costs that need to be covered to get this initiative off the ground. If you’d be willing to help, put your donation in the basket in the narthex or send your donation directly to United Way, ear-marked “Community Diaper Bank Start Up Costs.” Checks can be made out to United Way.
If you have any questions, talk to Pastor Aleese. Thank you for your support of those in need in our community, and thanks for doing God’s Work with Your Hands!
Last month, we began talking about themes of gratitude and generosity. Many of you took up the 30-day gratitude challenge, and utilized the Gratitude Journals available to the congregation. Together, we took time to notice what we are thankful for in ourselves, in others, and in the world around us. But now what? As people who’ve returned to our Lord to offer our heartfelt thanks and praise, is that where it ends? Or, is there still another response?
Well, as our Gospel lesson indicated to us on Celebration Sunday, once we have returned to our Lord in thanks, we are commanded by Jesus to “get up and go.” In the Gospel story, Jesus encounters 10 lepers. Begging for mercy, they look to Jesus for healing. Seeing these lepers at a distance, Jesus sends them to the priests, and somewhere along their way, they are made whole. They are made clean. They are made new. But only one notices.That one returns. But even that isn’t the end of the story. Because after the man gives his thanks to Jesus, Jesus commands him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”
The truth is that YOU—like the man—have also been made well. You have been cleansed. And you have been given new life, restoring you to relationship with God and with those around you. But now, like the man, we are given the challenge: what are we going to do, or where are we going to go, as we “get up and go on our way”?
This is the question that is laid before us as disciples of Jesus and as a congregation. And, in truth, this is the question that is laid before us as we consider what it means to live a life of stewardship. Often, the word “stewardship” has left a bad taste in people’s mouths. For so long, “stewardship” has come to be equated with the church asking for money. But “stewardship,” at the heart of it all, is not just about money. Because stewardship is about more than money, offering plates, and pledges. And, to go even one step further, stewardship is about more than the “3 T’s”: time, talent, and treasure. Instead, stewardship, is about discipleship. In the words of Grace Pomroy Duddy, “It is the way that we love God and neighbor with our whole lives.” To take it one step further, stewardship is the way that we “get up and go,” living out of gratitude as we live on purpose for a purpose in God’s Kingdom.
On Sun., Oct 20, we paused as a congregation to intentionally think about one aspect of stewardship: our finances. To be clear, just as much as every other aspect of our lives is a part of our life of stewardship and discipleship, how we manage our finances is also a part of our life of stewardship and discipleship. This is one reason why the Stewardship Team and Council are encouraging households to consider their financial giving for year 2020.
But if we were to only talk about our financial stewardship and nothing else, we would be missing the point. Because stewardship is a lifestyle choice. It is a conscious decision to ask ourselves: As someone made new by the gift of Jesus, now what am I going to do to “get up and go on my way”? And how would Jesus have be use the gifts entrusted to me, for the sake of God’s whole kingdom?
When we start thinking about stewardship in this manner, it doesn’t take long for stewardship to encompass every part of our life. As much as we’d like to stick stewardship in a box and take it out about once a year when fall rolls around, the reality is that, just as much as discipleship is a lifelong commitment, so is stewardship.
So, as you consider your financial stewardship this season, I also invite you to consider how the entiretyof your life is an act of stewardship. And as you consider your life—the ways God has shown up to you, and the gifts God has entrusted to you—I invite you to consider: How is God calling me to “get up and go,” loving God and those around me? In thinking about that question, you just might begin to have an answer to what it means for YOU to live as a faithful steward.
Psalm 46 | On this Reformation Sunday, we remember the legacy of Martin Luther and the Reformation, bringing change to the church in the mid-1500s. But the church wasn’t the only thing that was shifting. The whole world was on course to drastically change. Today, our lives are filled with changes. But in the mist of change, we look to our Lord as our refuge and strength, and come to remain in Christ, the living Word.
Luke 17:11-19 | God shows up in our lives on a daily basis. But have we taken the time to notice? And if we’ve noticed, how have we turned back to respond in faith?
Genesis 1:1-2:3 | In the beginning, God created all that is from the dust of the earth. But since then, God hasn’t stopped bringing order from chaos. God creates us as people made on purpose for a purpose, to share God’s light with the world.